Associating a place with chess and feeling ambivalent towards it is quite natural in my opinion well for we club and county players that is… .
Portsmouth: in 1992, we had a student from Portsmouth join Kents/Luton Chess Club, his name was James Taylor and he was rated 135. We both played for the county and got on like a house on fire, being the same sort of age and so on. In the winter of 1993, a tournament was held in Southsea where his family home was. I agree to stay there with him and play in the tournament also. I then persuaded several other members from my club to enter also. And so, on a cold afternoon with light snow that February day, we all drove down in D. Cruz’s black panther.
J. Taylor’s family home was warm and welcoming even though I turned up wearing clothes only those well into grunge wore.
It was the first time ever I played in a 6-round swiss, with the first game on the Friday night, three games on the Saturday and the final two rounds on the Sunday. I entered the Major section, which was an U-170.
That year I became much more solid as a player and became tough to beat. This was exemplified in the first two games, both of which I drew despite being on the backfoot throughout both, against opponents rated 200 ELO points above me. But the second draw was particularly tough. Our driver down saw how I went wrong in the opening and assumed it was completely lost. I similar thing occurred in the third game, after which not being a tournament player anyway caught up with me, and I went on to lose my next two games without really trying, only to win my final game, leaving me with 2.5 out of 6.
What stood out above all was not the chess though, it was the experience on the whole, which was very pleasant indeed. Memories are put in chronological order except the last one:
- I loved the clear, crisp, icy cold weather with very light snow being blown about on the pavements in low winter light.
- Being complimented by my opponent in Round 1 for my strong defensive skills.
- Being made breakfast by and having it with James’s family at the start of day 2 on a rather posh avenue somewhere in SouthSea.
- Being offered a draw by a panicky opponent in round two after I established decent counterplay in a position that had been lost for some time.
- Seeing some girl wearing grunge clothes with a long white dress and heavy black DM boots in the tournament hall and sat down for hours often read novels by herself. She certainly caught my eye.
- Bumping into fellow Bedfordshire league player, the Scotsman Tom Matko, who used to play for Cranfield, who played 1. f4 like I did back then, and against who I had many hair-raising draws. We then went for a walk along the seafront on the final day. He bought a Yorkie bar at an off-licence and explained that he rarely ate chocolate as he trained to run in marathons frequently. I really liked him and enjoyed our walk along Southsea Castle, despite the bitterly cold wind.
- The least pleasant memory has nothing to do with the fact that after three games I lost interest but that one evening in Damon’s car, we got some pizza and ate it in his car. I burnt the top of my mouth on mine badly.
Chess & Football: Portsmouth. At the beginning of the 2008/2009 season, Luton were away to Portsmouth on Aug 4th, and I went to the match. We lost 1-0 but should have won. Siting in the chair behind me was former Luton Chess Club member Ken Grogan. Two photos I took from where I was sitting.
MJM, Colombia
McCreadyandChess 